The Yellow Flash
by shining.star.rae
Summary: Anyone in the village of Konoha could tell you who the Yellow Flash was. A hero, a legend, a monster. But only some would look past his reputation and remember the happy little boy who would run around the village, helping those he could and causing trouble with the Uzumaki and Uchiha's. Fewer still were the people who said his journey all began when he met Uzumaki Mito.
1. Prologue

It starts like this: there is a boy with a smile

There is a boy with a smile and too knowing eyes. He has spikey blond hair and works two jobs. One is early in the morning at the library; it's his favorite and sometimes he'll take extra shifts. The second is random community work around the neighborhood; it pays a lot less but he enjoys being able to help to others. Every day he puts away a few dollars for necessities like food; the rest pays the water and electrical bills at the end of each month. He does not have heat and he's thankful the house itself is already payed off.

At noon every day, he comes back from the library to make lunch; it's served on two plates. By the time he throws on a backpack, only one of the plates is cleaned up. The backpack is not for school. He has only ever gone to school for one year but he loves to read. As he heads for the front door, off to find work to do, a shuffling is heard from upstairs.

He leaves faster.

It happens like this: he's passing by a flower shop when the owner's daughter drags him into it. She's two years older than him and he considers her a sister. Her name is Azami. While they're passing the fully bloomed flowers, she prattles on about how well she's been doing and 'did you know that if you stab someone in the abdominal aorta, they'll die within minutes?' He says he didn't and then they're at the counter. The woman that's there is pacing like an angry wolf, practically snarling as she mutters something about how 'there are those who would see her suffer'. Her name is Michi. Azami is her daughter and they are offering him a job.

It's one week after the Day of Giving (most tend to call it the Red Day) and no one's been around to pick up the 200 white roses that were ordered. Again. For the seventh year in a row. The boy wonders aloud if the roses are somehow supposed to be for Michi. Her daughter laughs and the boy accepts the job offer out of sheer want to live. As they hustle him out of the shop with the roses and reluctantly accepted pay, his smile brightens. He cherishes all they've done for him these past two years.

Around two hours later, there's one rose left and he already knows who he wants to give it to, when he's compelled to stop. Sitting alone, watching as people go about their day is an older woman. Her hair is a graying red and she doesn't look particularly lonely (she looks fairly amused actually), but the boy's always been a stickler for seeing people sitting by themselves.

What happens next is this: the boy that has spikey blond hair and a smile that never comes off, walks up to the woman and holds out the rose he meant to lay on the grave of his mother.

"Hello," he introduces himself brightly. "I'm Namikaze Minato."

An eyebrow is raised and calloused fingers wrap around his own as the woman takes the flower. "And I," she says with a voice that sounds like laughter and thunder all rolled up in one, "Am Uzumaki Mito."


	2. Chapter 1: Meeting and Beginning

Uzumaki Mito quickly found herself toward the top of Minato's favorites list. She was intelligent, humorous, respectful, kind, and more than a little devious. The woman was amazing in every way and through her eyes and voice, Minato found himself looking at the world in new ways. The blond was in complete awe.

They sat together for a long while, nearly until the sun went behind the mountains, talking about all sorts of things. They started off with a guessing game. Mito explained that you would pick and watch a person or persons on the street while coming up with their whole life story. The game would have you continuing to guess until either the person disappeared from sight or until something you predicted about them was proven correct, in which case you earned a point. Mito earned points every time it was her turn, but Minato was close. He won 3 to her 29 times. She smiled and said he was better than most. After all, hardly anyone else would have been daring enough to predict those two women were secretly in a relationship behind their husbands back, or that the two husbands were also having an affair with each other. (Those next several minutes after both parties were exposed was really _quite_ entertaining, Mito would later say.)

After that they began to talk about songs and dances-the older woman seemed appalled when he said he had never learned any dances. ("It's important for all people to know at least one dance, Minato-kun. Dance is how people can express themselves or communicate. It's lively and enjoyable and highly amusing if you watch certain people.") Minato also quickly learned Mito had strange sense of humor and that she was no longer allowed into several pet and container stores because of reasons that were "really too silly" and "if I wanted to get back in, I would" also "they should really know better by now after what happened last time."

He did not end up asking what happened last time.

But it was when they began talking about her husband that the gears in Minato's mind starting turning.

"You know, he made me this bench." She ran a hand along the wood between the two of them fondly. "It was a gift for me, right after the village was made."

Minato hummed, running his own hands on the arm rest. There was something different about it than most benches, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. In fact, his finger wasn't running into anything…

"There are a few others like it. Around the village I mean, though, knowing him he probably popped a few out around different traveling roads." She smiled. "He was always so kind, even to people he would never meet."

 _Popping them out?_

Mito's fond gaze turned into annoyance. "Then the dumbass had to go and die. Honestly-" she rolled her eyes, "-you would think he would have grown out of his 'finding stupid ways to die phase' but nooo~. That ass had to leave me here to grow old without him! Do you know what I'm going to do to him when I see him if I die, Minato-kun?"

He blinked large blue eyes up at her. "Tie him up by his feet and bash him around the head with his own stupidity?"

That's what he's heard several wives threaten their husbands with anyway. So why wouldn't a dead wife do the same?

A smile curled around the older woman's lips and several lines around her eyes crinkled together. "Not a bad idea, but no. I was going to enlist the help of my brother-in-law and his older cousin. If they haven't gotten to him already that is. I'm sure Tobirama is waiting for me to arrive before doing anything. We're quite the terrifying duo."

Seeing as several of Mito's stories already made her out to be scary, Minato could honestly say that what Mito thought was 'terrifying' for other people, translated into somebody else's 'end-of-the-world-nightmare'. He felt very very sorry for her already dead husband.

"Anyway," she continued, "this bench is my favorite. Lightning had struck down one of the trees in the area long before there were as many markets and venues as there are now. We were clearing the area-which really meant my husband was accidentally scaring everyone by making the trees get up and walk to a different area in order to relocate-and I was with child. At one point I got a little nauseous and-"she chuckled at the memory-"Hashirama completely panicked and immediately from the lightning struck tree came a bench I could rest upon. This bench has roots going so far down into the earth, not even a tsunami could tear it up."

Minato blinked. Blinked again and took in a better notice of his surroundings. The bench was snuggled in nicely between two buildings, but it still allowed a good view of the street and none of the buildings across the way blocked the view of the Hokage Mountain. The bench itself was an unusually dark wood that, on further inspection, was probably not a natural black. Twisting onto his knees, Minato looked over the back rest, where several green plants were growing directly out of it. Then he twisted back around to look at the Hokage Mountain; the faces of Shodai and Nidaime could be seen.

"Oh? I see you are beginning to realize something, little wind blower."

"There aren't any nails in the bench," he mumbled. It was Mito's turn to hum.

"There never are in any of his."

Looking back at his afternoon companion, Minato gave sheepish smile. "Oh. I remember my co-worker saying they wanted to marry you."

The red head tilted her head back to laugh loudly. Several people glanced over out of curiosity, coming to a standstill in the street as they caught glimpse of the Uzumaki princess.

"Oh, Minato, you remind me so much of him," she said still chuckling moments later.

Minato felt his blush go all the way to his ears. "Of your husband?"

"Hmm, almost, but no." She shook her head and the tags in her hair swung. Mito smiled down at him. "No, you remind me of Tobirama. The way you say things sometimes. You know, he said something similar when we first met after realizing who I was-'Ah, I recall my brother saying he was infatuated with you'. It was both amusing and slightly hazardous, seeing as we had previously been creating a seal, but it was Tobirama, that's how his mind worked."

A crowd was starting to gather right across the street with people pointing and whispering. Minato wondered why no one had noticed her before.

"There are other things to," she said whilst standing. "Only Tobirama really enjoyed the training from earlier with me. Well, Minato-kun, it was a pleasure to meet you."

"It was nice to meet you too, Uzumaki-sama."

He slid off the bench and gave her a bow.

" _Tsk_ , none of that now, Minato-kun." Mito placed a hand under his chin and tilted his head back so he was looking directly into her onyx eyes. She wasn't an overly tall woman, nothing compared to Michie-san who was taller than a lot of men, but Mito's whole presence radiated respect and power that more than made up for whatever height she lacked in inches. Minato wondered how he didn't notice the real her before either. "You and I are friends now, Minato-kun. Call me Mito. Understand?"

"You're a good friend."

She winked at him, taking her tanned hand away and turning from him. "We must do this again soon, Minato-kun. I'll be on the lookout for you. Oh, I wanted to ask-" She glanced back over her shoulder, "How old are you?"

He tilted his head to the side in confusion at the question. "I'm six."

"But not currently in any school?"

"No?"

She gave a little noise of thought. "Like I said, I'll be on the lookout for you, Minato-kun."

And then she was gone. Only the faint smell of sea salt lingered and Minato wondered if that was what the ocean smelled like. He didn't have much time for thinking after that though. There was a crowd he needed to slip through and possibly some last minute work before going home to cook dinner. But later that night, he would curl up in bed and smile. Something very important had happened that day. He could feel it in his bones.

* * *

At the same time Minato was searching for work again, an older woman was approaching an office in the school known as The Academy. It was the only school in the whole village that trained and taught every shinobi leading up till their genin years.

School had been let out several hours ago, no more children rummaging the halls or filling the classrooms with noise. The bleakness of the hallway without any younglings was almost enough to remind a person that this was a school that taught you to kill and lie and use poisons and hunt other living humans. Despite that though, the woman moved onward. She had been born into a shinobi family and was used to this. If anything, they weren't learning enough. But who was she to say, the current Headmistress was better than the last one by leaps and bounds. Improvements had been made and would continue to be made.

A door at the far end of the building opened and a young woman behind the desk glanced up. Her teal blue eyes brightened.

"Mito-hime! What can I do for you?"

"Hitomi-chan, tell me, do you still send out pamphlets to civilians?"

The younger woman shrugged a shoulder while putting her pen down. "You know how it is, a lot of civilians these days are putting their kids into the shinobi system now that there's a way for their child to gain power without having to give them up. We don't really have to broadcast the school anymore, now that most shinobi clans are supporting us. However, I think I understand what you're trying to get at.

"There are some civilian families we think may benefit from entering the program, so we send them a letter through the mail. Or we send letters out to people who will benefit us. Which is always a plus. People can sign up to receive letters if they're considering it as well." Hitomi paused, fingering the ends of her hair. "Why, have you found anyone interesting?"

A fond smile appeared on the older woman's face and her dark eyes twinkled. "Have you ever heard of the civilian boy Namikaze Minato?"


End file.
